Elephant Vindaloo is set in South London's notorious and dilapidated district of the Elephant and Castle. It is staged in the 1980's against the political backdrop of Margaret Thatcher's Britain. The story revolves around the occupants of eight flats, off one stairwell, of a small crumbling Victorian council estate, over the course of one weekend. At the top of the stairwell to the right live squatters, Fat Sid and Vince. They make up the rhythm section of a local rock band The Neanderthals. Most of their spare is taken up looking after their fellow squatter's, teenage heroin addict Dolores, baby Jason. To add to their troubles Dolores brings home Little Wing, a beautiful but disturbed runaway. Next to the squat lives Nick, a reformed drug addict, given over to health foods and exercise. Nick carries a torch for our leading lady, Kate. Sophisticated, brilliant and glamorous, a chance meeting brings her an unexpected date with our equally gorgeous and sexy Jake, a would-be actor/model, and The Neanderthals front man. Below the squat, filthy disgusting Robert masturbates the weekend away. He is a window cleaner by trade, an electronic wizard by his own design, and has a sinister second career producing home videos. Next to vile Robert lives Leo, a card-carrying union carpenter. Leo is a kindhearted, cheerful lad; as thick as two short planks, and prone to an ill-fated love life. Beneath Robert yuppies, Dick and Selene, carry on their routine bondage and humiliation sex marathons, unaware that they are the centre of Robert's latest obsession. Next to Dick and Selene lives Ruby Rutt, a ferocious gout-ridden octogenarian. Ruby and her best friend Edith hold Saturday afternoon rituals of wrestling, Scotch, and cigarettes. The television blasts at decibels usually associated with adolescent boys, obscenities are yelled, fists are shaken; it is not a sight for small children. On the ground floor, beneath Dick and Selene, lives Alec Evans. Alec, a depressive pacifist artist, and Greenham Commom* widower, battles with his own growing political unrest as he suffers the continual absences of his self-righteous wife, Monica. Next door to Alec, Ugandan immigrant Seema Patel rules her husband with silent contempt, instilling terror on a daily basis. She crushes him with the subtlest of eye movements and a deportment of grace and aloofness. Elephant Vindaloo entertains a host of other characters: Fen, the rag and bone man and his dog, Scud. Gorky, a Polish refugee and his militant mother. Georgie, the gay world's answer to Stephen Hawking. Amorous grandfather Leonard, local villain Mean fuckin' Mike and Margaret, the reincarnation of the first Queen Elizabeth, to name but a few. * U.S. missile base picketed by woman and their children 24hrs a day for several years.
